If you've been paying regular attention to this blog and my social media feeds, you might have noticed that rollerball pens have been gradually working their way into my carry. Everyone talks about the Schmidt P8126/P8127 capless rollerball refill - and that refill is indeed one of the best out there for retractable pens. But what about other options for rollerball pens with caps? I'll walk you through two of my favorite refills here.

Montblanc Rollerball pens will accept both a traditional rollerball refill as well as a fineliner refill. I tend to switch between them and they're both good (though expensive).

In terms of overall quality and available color options, Montblanc makes my favorite rollerball refill. I've never had one dry out prematurely, the ink flow is consistent, and they're threaded, which eliminates any "tip wiggle" when used in authentic Montblanc pens. They also come in a wide range of colors, including not only black and blue, but red, green, turquoise, brown, and purple, in addition to periodic limited edition colors. The downside? As you might expect, price, which can run upwards of $7 per refill, depending on where you shop.

The Montblanc Le Petit Prince Classique Rollerball, courtesy of site sponsor Appelboom. Look for a full review in the future! This has the "bold" fineliner refill inserted. I've found that Montblanc refills tend to write a finer line than other brands - note the writing sample above comparing the Montblanc "medium" tip to the Schneider Topball 850 .5mm.

For a more economical take, my go-to option is the Schneider Topball 850, another quality German refill that I first discovered when I purchased the Field Notes "Brands Hall" rollerball pen a couple years back. It's possible to find these in a 10-pack at around $1-2 per refill, which is exceptional value, and the best part is that the Topball 850 comes in a .5mm tip size. I currently have this refill loaded into an Aurora Optima rollerball, a Karas Kustoms Reaktor Galaxie, and even an Inventery Bolt Action Pen (though I'm not sure how long it will last, given that it's not technically a "capless" cartridge - so far, so good though). Size-wise, the Topball 850 seems to be compatible with most pens that take a Pilot G2-size refill, though note that it is NOT compatible with Montblanc pens, and I've not yet had the chance to experiment and find a less-expensive Montblanc refill option. It does appear that Monteverde makes a refill advertised as compatible with Montblanc pens, though I've not tried it so YMMV.

Takeaways and Where to Buy

Rollerball pens can serve as a much more functional writing instrument than fountain pens or even ballpoints, especially in a work environment. The main downside is that refills can get relatively expensive, especially on pricier cartridges like Montblanc. For general writing, I use the Schneider Topball 850 (purchased from Amazon) in most of my pens, which is quite economical when purchased in packs of ten. Colors options are limited to black and blue, though.

Montblanc rollerball refills are still among the best I've used over the years, and their "fineliner" option is exceptional. Montblanc cartridges are available from any authorized Montblanc retailer, but as I mentioned, they are quite pricey. I tend to bargain-hunt and stock up whenever I find a good deal, and Amazon is usually the easiest way to do that. As discussed above, if you can live with a "medium" tip size, Montblanc offers a selection of colors you can't find elsewhere in a rollerball. Note that Montblanc also releases rollerball versions of certain limited edition inks, such as Le Petit Prince, Lucky Orange, UNICEF Blue, and Writers' Edition inks such as Homer and Antoine de Saint-Exupery. These can be hard to find but do turn up if you look around or purchase directly from Montblanc.

Until recently, felt-tipped or porous-tipped marker pens (often simply called "fineliners") were never something I had considered using on a day-to-day basis. It wasn't until I had read the Pen Addict's reviews of the Sakura Pigma Micron--a pen I had never tried--that I picked up some marker pens on a business trip to New York City at the inimitable DaVinci Artist Supply. This first lot included a Micron in a .3mm tip (the "02" model), a Copic Multiliner in a .35mm tip, and a pack of the "Fine" Sharpie pens. I use all of these pens, and plan to post a thorough review of each of them in due time, but neither of these initial purchases really did it for me in terms of an everyday writer. They work great for jotting notes and doodling--and the Micron is the Field Notes Pen if you want dark black ink and absolutely no bleed through--but the Micron's tip felt a little fragile for heavy use, and I found the inks in the Copic and the Sharpies not quite dark and wet enough for my preference.

Enter Pilot. I'm a longtime user of Pilot pens, and as I mentioned in an earlier post, the Pilot Precise Liquid Ink Pen was the first pen I ever purchased by the box, way back when I was in school. Pilot has excellent dark black ink, even in its disposable pens. (If, like me, you can handle a bit of bleedthrough on super-cheap papers, a black Pilot pen might meet all of your black-ink needs.) On a whim, I picked up a four-pack of Pilot V Razor "Extra Fine" Marker Pens. Too broad. They wrote that great dark black line, but the width didn't allow me to do the type of tiny note-taking and annotation that I need to do at work. So I went online to see if Pilot made an even finer version of the pen, and I found these, at 10.99 for a dozen, on Amazon.

At 10.99/dz, you certainly can't beat the price.

After using this pen nearly exclusively for a week, I can safely say that this is a great fineliner. There has been no breakdown in the tip, from what I can tell, and the inkflow has remained consistent. That said, there is some (I would say minimal) bleedthrough with the ink. This is a true fineliner, intended for writing, so the ink is not super-precise and well-behaved like you would find in a technical drawing pen such as the Pigma Micron or the Copic Multiliner. What you lose in ink properties you gain in durability, and any issues with the ink still has not stopped me from using this pen on both sides of the page in a Field Notes notebook. I would say the bleedthrough is less than you would experience with any sort of fountain pen or rollerball.

This is the tip after two-weeks of heavy use. Minimal, if any, breakdown, and the pen is still going strong. I suspect that if I had used fineliners prior to using fountain pens, tip durability might be an issue, but for fountain pen users who are accustomed to writing with less pressure, durability is less of a concern.

If you are looking for a purchase that will run you approximately $.92 / pen, IMHO the Razor Point II can't be beat. You can find a Micron in the $2-3 range (for a single pen), but to me, who is more or less a cheapskate, that still stings a bit if/when you lose it, or when the tip breaks down when the pen is only half empty. I'm pretty sure I've already misplaced one of the Pilot V Razors (if it didn't "walk" of my desk at work when I was out of town last week), and even that is eating at me. Don't laugh, I know I have problems.

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